week 35 / 27 August 2015 STRONG RESULTS Digital growth and German TV business drive RTL Group half-year results week 35 / 27 August 2015 STRONG RESULTS Digital growth and German TV business drive RTL Group half-year results Cover Montage Publisher RTL Group 45, Bd Pierre Frieden L-1543 Luxembourg Editor, Design, Production RTL Group Corporate Communications & Marketing k before y hin ou T p r in t backstage.rtlgroup.com backstage.rtlgroup.fr backstage.rtlgroup.de BACK FROM HOLIDAYS QUICK VIEW A wild partnership FremantleMedia p.10 Half-year results 2015 RTL Group “We have always been p.4–9 super pioneers in trends” RTL Group p.11-12 Dynamic presence at VidCon BroadbandTV/StyleHaul p.13–14 A game-changer for the new generation It’s back-to-school of music stars season in Belgium BroadbandTV RTL Belgium p.15–16 p.19-20 Lots of new programming Big Picture Vox p.21 p.17-18 SHORT NEWS PEOPLE p.22–23 p.24–26 “TRANSFORMING RTL GROUP INTO A GLOBAL FORCE IN At the occasion of the half-year results 2015, Backstage talked to the VIDEO PRODUCTION, RTL Group Executive Committee about AGGREGATION AND financials, digital and the future of the Group. MONETISATION” Luxembourg – 27 August 2015 RTL Group Guillaume de Posch and Anke Schäferkordt, Co-CEOs of RTL Group, Elmar Heggen, Chief Financial Officer of RTL Group (from left to right) 4 How did RTL Group perform in the first half of 2015? H1/2015: RTL GROUP NET PROFIT UP Anke Schäferkordt: The half-year results 73.8 PER CENT demonstrate our strength: RTL Group once again delivered a very strong set of financial results – and Reported Group revenue was up 3.8 per the Group is also growing its top line again. In the cent to €2,788 million (H1/2014: €2,687 first half of 2015, RTL Group significantly increased million) thanks to strongly increasing revenue, EBITA and net profit. This was mainly due revenue at Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland, to two factors: First, RTL Group’s largest profit centre growing digital revenue and favourable – Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland – continued its exchange rate effects strong financial performance. Secondly, digital has become a driver of revenue growth. Reported EBITA was up 3.3 per cent to €534 million compared to €517 million in Guillaume de Posch: Indeed, the share of digital has H1/2014, mainly driven by Mediengruppe doubled in the past 12 months, now representing RTL Deutschland, resulting in a stable already 8 per cent of RTL Group’s total revenue. EBITA margin at 19.2 per cent You see, RTL Group’s revenue is highly diversified, with leading positions in all segments of the total RTL Group’s digital revenue1 continued video market: broadcast, content, digital. RTL Group to show very dynamic growth, performed especially well in the second quarter of up 94 per cent to €219 million the year, with revenue up 7.7 per cent and EBITA up (H1/2014: €113 million), benefitting from 4.3 per cent. organic growth and new acquisitions Speaking of digital, what drives this Net profit attributable to RTL Group strong growth? shareholders was up 73.8 per cent to €351 million (H1/2014: Guillaume de Posch: In the first half of 2015, our €202 million) ‘pure’ digital revenue – excluding e-commerce, home shopping and platform revenue for digital TV– was up Net cash from operating activities by 94 per cent to €219 million. Looking at our recent amounted to €295 million, resulting digital investments, BroadbandTV, StyleHaul and in an operating cash conversion of SpotXchange, which are now grouped together in 74 per cent; RTL Group had net financial the RTL Digital Hub, revenues have been increasing debt of €1,003 million as of 30 June 2015 by high double digit growth rates – and we expect them to continue to do so for the foreseeable future. On 26 August 2015, RTL Group’s Board For the full year 2012, we posted a total of 7 billion of Directors authorised the distribution online video views. Currently, we generate 8 billion of an extraordinary interim dividend of online video views per month. Consequently, we €1.00 per share, to be paid in September expect that we will reach more than 80 billion online 2015. This reflects the Group’s cash flows video views at the full year 2015. and its target net debt to full-year EBITDA ratio of 0.5 to 1.0 times Anke Schäferkordt: Online video is at the heart of our digital strategy – and it’s the focus of our 1 Excluding e-commerce, home shopping and platform revenue investments in this space. In June, we launched for digital TV the RTL Digital Hub, in order to drive leadership and growth in the digital video market. The new unit bundles our recent investments in the online video segment and will maximise the value of this highly complementary portfolio of digital video businesses. It will also scan the market intensively for further investment opportunities in the space. Next > 5 In recent weeks there were many reports joint task to develop our rapidly growing reach in about TV companies under pressure, in online video into a more significant and profitable particular in the United States. How do third pillar of RTL Group. And we’re making major you see the future of TV? progress as demonstrated by our half-year results. Anke Schäferkordt: Linear TV dominates the video What is your guidance for the rest of the market and is the only medium consistently reaching year? mass audiences day by day. In total, people watch more video content than ever before – long-form Elmar Heggen: Assuming there will not be major and short-form, linear and non-linear, on the TV changes in the economic climate across our screen and on multiple devices. The demand for markets, we raise our outlook for the full year 2015. high-quality video content is growing rapidly, as does We now expect our total revenue to be slightly up online video advertising. Looking at these trends, compared to the full year 2014. We expect full-year you could even say that we operate in a high-growth reported EBITA to be in line with last year despite industry – because for us, TV does not stand for lower contributions from one-off gains in 2015. “television” anymore, but for “total video. Guillaume de Posch: The good news is: RTL Group already has leading market positions across the whole value chain of this rapidly evolving total video Q2/2015: DYNAMIC GROWTH OF market. With our financial strength, it is our ambition REVENUE, EBITA AND NET PROFIT to significantly grow RTL Group over the next years – to transform the leading European entertainment In the second quarter of 2015, RTL Group’s network into a global force in video production, revenue was up 7.7 per cent to €1,480 aggregation and monetisation. million (Q2/2014: €1,374 million), driven by higher revenue from Mediengruppe How much money can RTL Group spend RTL Deutschland, digital assets and on growth investments? FremantleMedia Elmar Heggen: As demonstrated in 2014, our EBITA was up 4.3 per cent to €340 million strong cash flows allow us to combine attractive (Q2/2014: €326 million) dividend payments with significant investments in digital and content. Clearly, we won’t change our Net profit attributable to RTL Group strict investment criteria. But with profit margins shareholders more than doubled in the at high levels for most of our families of channels, second quarter to €245 million (Q2/2014: it’s imperative to find the next growth drivers for €111 million) our Group. With our recent investments, we’ve accelerated our digital strategy. Now it will be our Next > 6 SEGMENTS: MEDIENGRUPPE RTL DEUTSCHLAND CONTINUES OUTSTANDING FINANCIAL PERFOMANCE During the first half of 2015, advertising market conditions showed a mixed picture: looking across the Group’s markets, RTL Group estimates that the net TV advertising markets in Germany, France and Spain were up, while the market developments in the Netherlands, Belgium and Hungary remained challenging. Nonetheless, all of RTL Group’s families of channels – with the exception of Groupe M6 – were outperforming their respective markets Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland’s EBITA reached a new record high for a first half at €343 million, up 9.6 per cent from €313 million in H1/2014, driven by significantly higher TV advertising and also higher diversification revenue At Groupe M6, EBITA decreased to €105 million (H1/2014: €111 million), mainly reflecting lower EBITA contributions from the company’s diversification businesses FremantleMedia’s EBITA was broadly stable at €28 million (H1/2014: €29 million) RTL Nederland’s EBITA was down to €27 million (H1/2014: €44 million), mainly due to challenging advertising market conditions RTL Hungary’s EBITA was up to €16 million (H1/2014: €5 million), driven by one-off effects such as the partial reversal of a stock valuation allowance and the re-claim of the advertising tax paid in 2014 Next > 7 FREMANTLEMEDIA CONTINUES ITS PUSH INTO SCRIPTED PRIME-TIME ENTERTAINMENT In August 2015, FremantleMedia acquired a 62.5 per cent majority stake in Wildside, an Italian TV and feature film production company. The acquisition strengthens FremantleMedia’s prime-time scripted business in the Italian market and bolsters the global content pipeline of FremantleMedia. In June, the US premium cable channel Starz gave the greenlight to FremantleMedia North America’s adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s acclaimed contemporary fantasy novel American Gods Having acquired the international distribution rights to UFA Fiction’s Deutschland 83 FremantleMedia International (FMI) announced an agreement with AMC’s Sundance TV that saw the Cold War inspired drama become the first German-language series to air on a major US channel.